


i caught you staring at the sun

by ineedsomecyanide



Category: Per qualche dollaro in più | For a Few Dollars More (1965)
Genre: First Kiss, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Canon, Yearning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-08
Updated: 2020-12-08
Packaged: 2021-03-10 01:48:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,256
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27956396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ineedsomecyanide/pseuds/ineedsomecyanide
Summary: It wasn’t easy settling in just one place after a life spent chasing gunslingers and bandits, never knowing if this was your last night on Earth. Not that he ever cared that much, it was part of the job.He started caring a little bit more when he met Douglas. He still wanted to see a couple of sunsets with him, you know.After defeating El Indio and his men, Manco finally bought his ranch and settled down.
But sometimes home isn't a place, but a feeling, and Manco feels like something is missing...
Relationships: "Manco" | The Man with No Name/Douglas Mortimer
Comments: 8
Kudos: 12





	i caught you staring at the sun

**Author's Note:**

> Before we begin, let me get some things straight:
> 
>   * these bounty killers aren't (ahahahah I’m not funny);
>   * this is my first fic in this fandom, and it’s unbeta’d;
>   * I don't know anything about American geography;
>   * this specific scenario has probably been done over and over again, but two cakes, amirite?
> 


There’s a bruise on Douglas’s right cheekbone, Manco notices. It’s half hidden by the shade of his hat, but it’s there, angry and purple against Douglas’s tanned skin. It makes Manco’s stomach churn too much for his liking: he’s used to being beaten up, and seeing people being beaten up, hell, he’s had his fair share of kicks and punches yesterday. So why the bruises on Douglas’s skin make him so angry? He wants to give El Indio a bruise right there, and then much more. He wants to press salve, and a cloth wetted in cold water to Douglas’s cheekbone. He wants to press his lips lightly, right there, to make him feel better.

He brushes off these thoughts from his mind: right now is not the time. They are standing in the blazing sun, waiting for El Indio’s men to do something, to arrive, to shoot, to run away. Anything to put them out of their stasis. He, who always loved the thrill of the chase, wishes for a moment to be away from there, in the dim light of a cool room, where they can treat their wounds properly, and maybe lie in the dark together.

No, now it’s not the time for these thoughts. He needs to be present, and quick to draw his gun. But now he understands those who chase revenge for love.

* * *

The sun is shining on Manco’s back, but when it doesn’t. He has thought about buying his ranch somewhere up North, maybe Utah, where winters are harsh, and it snows, and the land is green in summer. But deeply inside him, he knows he would have never adjusted to that place, and he’d missed the desert, its puny trees and its soil burnt by the sun.

The money from the reward bought him a lonely ranch surrounded by land and fields, and cattle, and left him with enough money to not be worried and to pay a farmhand to help him.

He likes to do most of the work himself, anyway. It’s a good way to keep himself busy – it wasn’t easy settling in just one place after a life spent chasing gunslingers and bandits from town to town, always on his horse, always on the run, eating badly, sleeping worse, never knowing if this was your last night on Earth. Not that he ever cared that much, it was part of the job.

He started caring a little bit more when he met Douglas. He still wanted to see a couple of sunsets with him, you know. Farm work is a way to not to think about him, because, no matter what he tells himself, he still thinks about him every day.

He’s not a man to get sappy or nostalgic, but he misses him. He misses the faint smoke of his pipe, he misses him calling him “boy”, he misses his gentle smile and fierce courage. Sometimes Manco catches himself thinking about how would Douglas do a certain thing, how would he organize the cutlery (he always so neat and proper), or would he know anything about improving the productivity of a crop? These thoughts are promptly dismissed, but they were there for a moment.

He still had some work to do, he had told him, more bandits to shoots and justice to serve. Their partnership was over, and it was only natural to split and go on their separate paths.

He had bought his ranch, and Douglas had moved on with his life and vengeance plan.

Manco had considered sending him a telegram in some big city he was sure he’d cross sometimes, but all his accounts of his ranch, and crops to water, and calves being born seemed so foolish once he had written them down. So he had crumpled the paper and tried to forget. He later found out he was particularly bad at it.

A voice in the distance brings him back to the present, to the soil and his hoe and his potatoes to plant, that are soon abandoned again, when his farmhand informs him that there’s a man at the door.

He cleans his hands on his trousers, he lowers his hat on his eyes, and pats a drawer searching for his gun. After a life spent chasing bandits, you never know who may appear at your doorstep.

The door opens with a creak, and the reality beyond it it’s less dangerous than a bandit, but maybe more difficult to face.

On the threshold stands Douglas Mortimer in the flesh, dustier and bloodier than Manco remembered, but still very much alive.

“Welcome back, old man. You took your time.”

Douglas cracks a small smile. “Would you let an old man come in, and tend at his wounds?”

Manco all but embraces him, and helps him getting through the door, and in his room. He hastily gets gauze, thread and needle because you never know with bounty killers, and a bottle of his worse whiskey – at worst, he’ll use it to clean the wounds, at best, they’ll drink together to celebrate Douglas coming home.

He helps him out of his waistcoat and shirt. When he had imagined Douglas in his bed, he had imagined him less bloody and less dusty. He almost didn’t recognize him, at first. He, who was always so pristine even in the desert dust, now was covered in dirt, as he had galloped fast to come and find him. _He doesn’t dare to hope that he did it for him._

“How did you find me?” Manco asks, to distract Douglas from the burning sensation that he must feel. His wounds aren’t bad: most of them are shallow, or bruises, but there’s a cut a little too close to Douglas’s heart for Manco’s comfort that needs his attention.

“People talk. The legend of a lone bounty hunter, who uses his right hand only to shoot are hard to kill”.

“I’m sure none if it it’s true”. Manco smirks, and lifts his eyes briefly from his work. He meets Douglas’s eyes, and he smiles, like a day hasn’t passed since they parted ways. Manco feels a tug at his heart, that he decides to ignore.

“Who did this to you?” Manco whispers, not sure if he should say it aloud.

A small, sharp intake of breath. “It doesn’t matter. They’re dead now.”

“Did you claim your reward?”

“Of course, boy”. Manco smirks again, hoping that Douglas is doing the same.

There’s a cut on Douglas’s cheekbone where there once was a bruise. Manco cleans and bandages it, and then – and then he does what he had wanted to do a long time ago, and presses his lips to the newly-bandaged cut.

“To make me feel better?” asks Douglas, wanting to jest, but his voice doesn’t sound so sure anymore.

They lock eyes for a moment that feels brief and yet infinite, their breaths shallow. This feels so much worse than a duel, damnit.

And then Douglas’s lips are on his, and Manco he’s trying to be soft and careful – too careful – he wouldn’t be this careful but there’s a wounded man beneath him, and he wouldn’t ruin the work he has done with the bandages, and he doesn’t want to hurt him-

But then Douglas has his arm around his waist, and he’s pulling him close, and the temptation of throwing carefulness out of the window is too strong.

* * *

They’re lying in a dark, cool room like he had dreamed, and Manco finally feels like he’s come home.

**Author's Note:**

> I'd like to thank Enea from Discord, who gave me the idea for the second part of this fic, and my friend Mel, for bullying me into posting this fic. 💖


End file.
